


Like Steel, Like Fire

by Maayacola



Category: Big Bang (Band)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-07
Updated: 2012-12-07
Packaged: 2017-11-20 13:41:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,719
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/585975
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Maayacola/pseuds/Maayacola
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Perfect doesn’t mean what Jiyong thinks it means.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Like Steel, Like Fire

Seungri’s hungry. He’s come straight to the meeting from the gym, and his abs burn from his workout. But it’ll be worth it. They’ve got a photo shoot, after all, for the covers. They’re going for an edgy image, with icicles and oxygen masks and Seunghyun has dyed his hair aquamarine. Seungri’s going to be shirtless. That’s his edgy move, apparently. He runs a hand through hair that’s even shorter than usual, and sighs.

“We’re coming back with all six tracks,” Jiyong says, ball-cap pulled low over his brow and hair falling into his face. He’s buzzed the left of it, but the right hangs long enough to hide his eyes. “We’re going to promote all of them at once.”

“That’s crazy,” Seunghyun says, even as a challenging smirk pulls at his face. “That’s six sets of choreo, six songs people have to buy, and what, six music videos? That’s _crazy_.”

“No, it’s bold,” Jiyong says, and Youngbae leans back on the couch, arms crossed behind his head. “It’s coming back with a bang.”

“Because we’re BIG _BANG_ ,” Daesung says, and Seungri rolls his eyes, and Seunghyun snorts and claps twice, because he loves corny jokes. Daesung smiles wide, and his eyes disappear into half-crescents.

Seungri suddenly feels more relaxed. He smiles back at Daesung. Jiyong isn’t smiling, though, and Seungri isn’t sure if Youngbae is either, because Youngbae is wearing sunglasses inside again. “This is it,” Jiyong says. “Our chance to… well, we’ve got to come strong out of the gate, after the hiatus.”

_The hiatus._ They’ve referred to it as a lot of things. A break. Just a little time off until things simmered down. Just a bit of space from the fans while the dust settled. But hiatus sounds more desperate, more serious, than that. Jiyong’s face is indecipherable.

“Of course,” Daesung says, and the smile has faded from his face, and Seungri hates that. Daesung’s changed, like something in him has twisted around itself, leaving him more somber and measured. Seungri really hates it.

Seunghyun is draped over his chair, long limbs everywhere, with his chin resting on his upper arm. “It’s going to be great. The hype is already sounding good.” Seunghyun’s tone is optimistic.

Youngbae sighs. “And yet.”

“And yet,” Seungri echoes, and Jiyong’s eyes find his.

Press releases. _”Is it too soon for a BIG BANG comeback?”_ and _”Following two member scandals, is BIG BANG ready for the limelight once more?”_

It’s a new year. 2012. Seungri’s world hasn’t ended yet.

“We’ve got to do our best,” Jiyong says, and it’s not… it’s not his usual tone, cocky and confident. It’s more like the one Seungri’s been hearing lately, threads of insecurity that had never been there before weaving their way into the words. It leaves Seungri a little breathless, because that’s not how Jiyong is supposed to sound. Jiyong is supposed to sound fearless and brave and unshakeable, the way he’s sounded since Seungri was sixteen and Jiyong was everything Seungri wanted to be. “This is it.”

“Okay,” Seungri says, and he wonders if the others hear it too. Hear that Jiyong is just a little bit broken now. “Of course, we’ll do our best.”

As if Seungri would ever give Jiyong anything less.

“We’ve got this,” Seunghyun says, and Youngbae offers a shy grin, and Daesung pumps his fist excitedly. Jiyong looks at them all, the shadows growing darker in his eyes.

“It’ll be perfect.”

Perfect. Right.

 

*

“Maknae,” Jiyong says. “I’m your favorite, right?” Jiyong asks, leaning into Seungri’s personal space. Seungri leans back, as usual, because Jiyong makes his heart beat faster, and he doesn’t want to think about what that means.

“No,” Seungri says, but his voice cracks on it, and so he winks, so that Jiyong will think he’s been found out on purpose. Jiyong just peers at him curiously, mouth pursed. “Yes.”

“Because you think I’m perfect, right?” Jiyong’s tone sounds strange.

“Well,” Seungri says, and then he blushes, because everyone is looking at him. “It’s more because…”

“Because…?” Daesung puffs out, doing pushups as he listens. Seunghyun, who seems bored of talking, does a little chicken dance and then finishes with jazz hands. “I’m the perfect one, here. I should be maknae’s favorite.”

Youngbae laughs. “Yeah, maybe you should be,” he says, and Seunghyun waggles his eyebrows at Seungri, and Seungri laughs.

Jiyong huffs and crosses his arms, and then Youngbae is in the middle as Seunghyun and Daesung tease each other, and Jiyong leans close again, resting his hand on Seungri’s thigh. It tingles through the fabric. “But I’m maknae’s favorite. Why?”

If you’d asked him a year ago, Seungri would have had hundreds of answers, about how much he respects Jiyong and how much he loves Jiyong’s music, and how much he thinks Jiyong is the perfect idol.

But now all he can think about is how Jiyong’s eyes glimmer under the fluorescents, dark and intoxicating, the way his hand is so warm on Seungri’s thigh, and the way Jiyong’s teeth, a little crooked and gapped, somehow still make a flawless smile.

“Because…” Seungri says, and the words are stuck in his throat. “Because Jiyong is Jiyong.” And he realizes, belatedly, that he hasn’t used _hyung_ , but Jiyong doesn’t seem to mind. His whole face softens.

“Is that enough?” he asks, and Seungri looks at him incredulously.

_Of course it is_ , he thinks, because Jiyong is everything.

 

*

 

When Seungri grows up, he wants to be just like Jiyong. Jiyong is smart, and talented, and cool, and he walks like he’s got everything, like he knows everything, and it’s because he _does_. At least to Seungri, he does, because Seungri watches every move Jiyong makes and he’s never seen Jiyong take a step off the path he’s chosen for himself. Jiyong is made of things like steel and fire and determination.

Jiyong hates Seungri, but Seungri hopes that it won’t always be that way.

“I really admire you, hyung,” Seungri says, because he’s not really one to watch what he says, and Jiyong smiles, this cocky half-smile that makes him look far older than eighteen. Seungri feels so young next to Jiyong, because there’s something wise in Jiyong’s eyes that makes Seungri want to dive inside of them and search for all of Jiyong’s secrets. He wants to see the things that hide in the shadows there.

“I’m only two years older than you,” Jiyong says, and there’s a patronizing lilt in his tone that belies the words, because it’s been obvious to both of them for a while now that there is so much more than two years of age standing between them. Seungri can only see how worldly Jiyong is; how much Jiyong already knows that Seungri hasn’t even begun to learn.

“I think hyung is the sort of person I’d like to be,” Seungri says, and he swallows down the rest.

The rest is: _Jiyong-hyung is talented, and good at everything, and has an aura that makes Seungri want to stand closer, so he can bathe in that light._

“I’m not perfect,” Jiyong says. “And you’ll only get hurt if you think I am.” Jiyong stops, the convenience store bag in his hand banging against Seungri’s leg.

“Yes you are,” Seungri says, and Jiyong’s eyes widen, and Seungri blushes and looks away, because maybe he should have swallowed that down, too.

Jiyong doesn’t always take compliments well. Seungri thinks it’s not because Jiyong thinks he doesn’t deserve them, it’s more that Jiyong doesn’t know how to accept them graciously, without saying _“I know, obviously,”_ which is what he wants to say.

“You’re an idiot. We should have been a four member band,” Jiyong says, but he lets his shoulder bump Seungri’s as they keep walking, the bag swinging between their legs, and the back of Seungri’s hand occasionally brushing Jiyong’s. Jiyong’s smile is a little less jaded, Seungri thinks, and maybe someday Jiyong might even like him.

“I’ll work so hard,” Seungri says, and Jiyong sucks his lower lip into his mouth thoughtfully.

“You’d better,” Jiyong says. “I’ll only accept your best.”

As if Seungri would dream of giving Jiyong anything less.

Seungri is sixteen, and he’s not sure what this feeling is, but it burns and burns and it’s hard for him to imagine that there’s anything in the world that could hurt more than this.

“You’ll never catch me, kid, but I expect you to try.”

 

*

 

Everyone is surprised when Jiyong volunteers to be Seungri’s roommate.

“Might as well get used to him,” Jiyong says, and he doesn’t meet Seungri’s eyes.

Still, Seungri feels his chest constrict, with pleasure or hope or whatever it is he feels when Jiyong extends any sort of gesture toward him that isn’t cold indifference.

“I’m a quiet sleeper,” Seungri says, somehow, and Jiyong looks up in surprise. “And I can sleep even if the lights are on.”

“I know,” Jiyong says. Jiyong likes to wake up at three in the morning and start writing songs, and he gets frustrated when Seunghyun plays his music too loud through his headphones for Jiyong to concentrate on his own words, and his own melodies. “I remember. I’m going to drive you crazy, kid.”

He calls Seungri kid, and Seungri wonders if maybe, to Jiyong, he is. He didn’t grow up being groomed to be an idol. He just decided one day he might like to be, and now he’s here, and he doesn’t know the ropes… he can’t even find the ropes. He wonders if they’re over on the other side of the universe, with his bandmates, and maybe he should stop fumbling for them in the dark.

“You won’t,” Seungri vows. “You could never.”

And then Jiyong smiles at him, a genuine smile, and it’s like Seungri’s flying. And then Jiyong cuts his eyes away, and Youngbae looks at Jiyong steadily, and then he frowns at Seungri, who’s trying to pull his heart out of his eyes.

“Don’t encourage him,” Youngbae says, later, when it’s just the two of them and a couple of bottles of juice from the vending machine, Youngbae’s towel wet with sweat from rehearsal and hanging about his shoulders like a mantle. “Don’t keep looking at him like he’s the sun in the sky.”

“Why?” Seungri asks. “Because _you’re_ the sun?” It’s a frequent joke, because none of them can call him by his stage name in private, though they’ve all tried at one time or another. _Taeyang_ just doesn’t roll off the tongue. It’s too flashy for Youngbae, who is quiet and steady and calm. “Or because you think it will make him arrogant?”

Seungri thinks that’s a lost cause, because Jiyong is already arrogant. Jiyong knows he’s good. He knows he’s the best, and it shows in every false humble glance, and every impatient look as he waits for Seungri to catch up. It’s okay, because sometimes Seungri is arrogant too.

“No,” Youngbae says, and he slants his eyes at Seungri in a way that makes Seungri wonder if he’s missing something obvious. “Because if you look at him like that, he’ll kill himself trying to live up to it.”

Seungri doesn’t really understand that, because Jiyong doesn’t have to try, does he, to be everything Seungri admires?

“He likes that you think he’s perfect,” Youngbae says. “He likes that you buy the image he’d like to sell to everyone. But he’s just a person, Ri. He’s a person, just like everyone else.”

“I know that,” Seungri says, but he might be lying, because Jiyong, for Seungri, is far more than that.

*

Jiyong doesn’t let people into his space, at first.

When he finally does, it’s Seungri he chooses, winding skinny limbs around Seungri’s neck, or planting kisses on Seungri’s round cheeks, or making lewd jokes as his hands toy with the hem of Seungri’s t-shirt, naughty winks directed at the camera and not Seungri himself.

Some think it’s pretend, and that Jiyong does it because it makes the girls shriek, but Jiyong does it when no one is watching, too, and Seungri doesn’t know what that means. Others assume it’s because Seungri is the youngest, but that’s never mattered to Jiyong except that Seungri is someone who is below him, someone who Jiyong has to lead.

Seungri knows it’s because Jiyong thinks Seungri is safe, because Seungri still thinks he is perfect, even though Seungri has seen so many sides of Jiyong that the rest of the world has never seen. Seungri has seen Jiyong when he’s too tired for masks, and Seungri still thinks Jiyong is perfect, and maybe that’s what Jiyong needs.

 

*

 

Jiyong comes to rehearsal one day with a brand new smile. Flawless, white and gleaming. Seungri hates it, because Jiyong was already perfect, and already so far out of Seungri’s reach that it was like looking through a telescope to watch Jiyong move, Jiyong like a star in the sky.

Now Jiyong’s smile looks manufactured, and Seungri can only feel the coldness in it.

“Why’d you change them?” Seungri asks, irrationally angry, and Jiyong looks at Seungri with surprise. “Your teeth.”

“You noticed?” Jiyong looks pleased, almost like he’s congratulating himself.

“Well, yeah,” Seungri says, because he’s always watched Jiyong the most carefully. “Obviously.”

“Because they weren’t perfect,” Jiyong says. “Everything about me has to be perfect. Especially now.” A second single. Volume two. It has to be better than the first one. Seungri sees Jiyong at night, through slit eyes, balling up papers with half-formed songs and throwing them in the trash.

Seungri thinks Jiyong doesn’t really understand what perfect means.

 

*

Perfect is the way that Jiyong’s head falls onto Seungri’s shoulder when they’re sitting in the car on the way back to the dorms, gelled hair tickling at Seungri’s neck and breath warm on Seungri’s shoulder. “Maknae, stop moving,” Jiyong mumbles into the fabric of Seungri’s t-shirt, and Seungri laughs because they’re in a _car_.

Perfect is the way Jiyong’s fingers grip the pen, scrawling along the paper in hurried strokes, _Hangeul_ letters sloppy and almost illegible, crafting lyrics to a new single that will read like poetry and make Seungri shake down his core when he hears Jiyong sing them, or sings them himself. Jiyong’s got a way of chewing on the pen, too, or tapping his fingers on the desk, back hunched at an angle that will leave him knotted up later.

Perfect is the way that Jiyong moves too close, pinching Seungri’s cheeks and feigning kisses and grabbing fistfuls of shirt to drag Seungri into his bubble, the bubble that Jiyong barely lets anyone cross. “I love maknae,” he says, and he doesn’t care if there are cameras or if they are alone, it’s just Jiyong and his affection, and it leaves Seungri feeling so full of… _something_ that he might burst, because it’s not like when he was sixteen, and Jiyong could barely stand to look at him.

Perfect is… perfect is when they’re in the dorms, and Seungri can’t sleep, so he curls up next to Jiyong and watches him as his chest moves up and down, slow and steady, small mouth relaxed for the first time in days. Perfect is Jiyong pretending he doesn’t know Seungri is there. Perfect is the way he wakes up with Jiyong’s arm around his waist, comforting and warm in a way that makes Seungri forget he misses home at all.

 

*

 

Seungri wakes up to a text from Youngbae. _Jiyong’s in trouble_ it says. _Turn on the TV._

Things like _marijuana_ and _will BIGBANG survive another scandal?_ flash across the screen, and the images of Jiyong, eyes a little too wide, hair shorn shorter than Seungri’s seen it in years, flash across the screen, and his heart stops.

Seungri thinks he must be dreaming, because Jiyong would never do this to them, not when they are still reeling from Daesung’s accident. He keeps thinking he’s going to wake up, but when it keeps going, the same footage playing over and over again, Seungri realizes, with a sinking feeling in his gut, that it’s real, it’s all real.

Still he closes his eyes, and opens them again, because he wants to wake up.

Wasn’t 2011 bad enough?

*

The first time Seungri realizes it’s love isn’t at a convenient time, like while he lies eyes-closed in bed or when he’s alone in the shower, washing away the sweat of rehearsal down the drain, muscles aching from the pursuit of synchronization.

The first time Seungri realizes it’s love is on camera, as they stand side by side, Jiyong pushing his way causally into Seungri’s space, and Seungri backing up as usual, pretending to be annoyed when all he really wants to do is stand still and see how far Jiyong will take it. The audience is laughing, and the other members are laughing, and Jiyong looks pleased with himself, smug and satisfied, and Seungri likes it, likes everything about it.

He realizes that it is love because his heart literally stops at the sparkle in Jiyong’s eyes, and he knows, in that moment, that he’ll give anything he has to just to keep it there.

 

*

 

“You’re not so bad, maknae,” Jiyong says, as Seungri collapses onto the bench next to him, sweat soaking his tank shirt. “For a baby.”

“I’m not a baby,” Seungri says, pouring some of the water from his bottle onto his face. “Stop picking on me.”

Seungri has learned to fight back, because Jiyong smiles when he does, mirth teasing the corners of his mouth in a way that makes Seungri feel like he’s done something right.

“Yeah, don’t pick on the baby,” Seunghyun says, crossing his arms and plopping down on Seungri’s other side. “He’s teaching me the choreo after all.”

Seungri’s pretty sure he got landed with this because he’s the youngest, but he doesn’t mind. Seunghyun has two left feet, and Seungri’s still trying to prove he belongs here.

Sometimes he thinks about how fate has somehow given him a second chance in BIG BANG, and the way Jiyong had stared at him, eyes cold and uninterested, when he’d first been presented as the last member, replacing Hyunseung.

He thinks about it, and vows to spend as many hours as he has to in order to earn his place a hundred times over. He refuses to be the weak link.

“You’ll get it, hyung,” Seungri says, and smiles encouragingly at Seunghyun. “You’re too cool to let this beat you.”

Seunghyun laughs, and ruffles Seungri’s hair, and then raises an eyebrow. “Jealous?” he asks, but he’s not talking to Seungri, he’s talking over Seungri, and so Seungri turns his head back toward Jiyong, who’s scowling just a bit.

“He’s my maknae,” Jiyong says, and it’s weird, because he’s never said anything like that before.

Seungri doesn’t want the slow burn in his belly at all. It’s something that shouldn’t exist. There are things he shouldn’t want.

 

*

“Didn’t I tell you?” Jiyong says. “Didn’t I tell you I’m not perfect?”

Seungri’s hands clench into fists and his eyes feel wet, and Jiyong looks bruised and battered and worn.

“You did,” Seungri says. “But you never understood what I meant.”

 

*

Perfect is the way Jiyong comes closer when Seungri opens his arms to ask for a hug.

Perfect is the way Seungri cries and cries, and Jiyong lets him, running fingers through Seungri’s hair and pressing a round cheek against Seungri’s forehead as they sit on the couch, Seungri’s shoulders shaking.

Perfect is the way Jiyong says “I’m sorry, so sorry,” over and over again, breath hot and tinged with _soju_ as it blows across Seungri’s wet eyelashes.

Perfect is the way he means it.

Perfect is the way that Seungri can dig his fingers into Jiyong’s back so hard it leaves marks, and perfect is the way Seungri can forgive him.

 

*

 

Seungri’s eyes are so heavy.

“Don’t fall asleep, maknae,” Seunghyun says, adjusting the high collar of his military coat. “We’re too busy to fall asleep right now.”

“I’m so tired,” Seungri says, licking dry lips and letting his eyes fall shut. He isn’t sleeping, just resting. The swivel chair is surprisingly comfortable, and Seungri’s tempted to take a tiny nap, just until the makeup artists come, metal boxes of product clanking as they unpack them on the table and try and hide the fact that none of them have slept in days.

“It’s obvious,” Daesung says, and Seungri can hear the smile in his voice. “The bags under your eyes are darker than usual.”

Seungri winces, but doesn’t open his eyes. “Yeah?” He spins around in the chair, and it makes him just a bit dizzy. Maybe he should drink more water.

“Yeah,” Seunghyun says. “You look like I should be cutting down bamboo and feeding it to you.” Seungri can imagine the stupid face Seunghyun is making even without his sight. He always puffs out his cheeks and makes ‘bear faces’ and Seungri’s the youngest, so he just takes it. It’s not worth fighting back, since even though his name means ‘victory’ this is a battle he always loses.

“Oh good,” Seungri says. “Panda jokes. I do so love panda jokes.”

“Can’t leave you guys alone for five minutes, huh?” Youngbae says, as he and Jiyong walk into the room. Seungri opens his eyes.

Youngbae is wearing casual sweats and a bandana over his hair to hide the fact that he hasn’t spiked it yet, and his oversized sweatshirt has the sleeves pushed back casually.

Jiyong is wearing a leopard-print suit.

“Shouldn’t you guys be in costume already?” Daesung queries, tugging at his own jacket, which stretches across arm muscles that get bigger and bigger as the years go by. Seungri’s a little envious, but not _really_ , because of all the issues he has, self-confidence isn’t one of them.

“It’s fine,” Jiyong says, in that low, slow voice he saves for backstage. Seungri calls it his ‘off-air’ voice, because the Jiyong that the world sees is like Jiyong-lite, all the sparkly bits and none of the brooding, temperamental artist. “We just had to speak with a stage manager.”

“About?” Seungri asks, before he remembers that he’s really not supposed to, because Jiyong hates being questioned. “Never mind,” he mumbles, and closes his eyes again.

“Just stuff,” Youngbae says vaguely, already stripping.

Seungri can hear Youngbae's clothes hitting the ground in a messy heap. He’ll ball them up and shove them in his backpack before they go out, but not before Seunhyun steps on them and swears loudly, toppling onto Daesung’s lap and making Daesung make that crazy squawking sound he makes whenever he’s surprised. Seungri can imagine it already, and it makes him smile.

He can’t hear Jiyong at all, but that’s not unusual. As loud as Jiyong is on stage, behind closed doors he moves like a shadow. Seungri can imagine what Jiyong is doing too, slowly dragging his jacket down his arms, and laying it carefully across the arm of the couch, undoing buttons one by one like he has all the time in the world.

The door, and chatter. The make-up people are here. “You aren’t in costume yet?” one asks, and Jiyong just sighs. Seungri opens his eyes again, and Jiyong is standing there in just his pants, his blouse, and lime green atrocity, unbuttoned and hanging open, revealing a plain gray tank shirt underneath.

His jacket’s on the arm of the couch.

Seungri’s always watched Jiyong the most carefully.

“You didn’t sleep,” his artist says, as she puts a finger under his chin to tilt his face up to the light. “What am I going to do with you?”

Seungri smiles at her, a charming, little boy smile that always gets him out of trouble, because it reminds everyone of when he was sixteen, even though now he’s twenty-two and capable of much more mischief. “It’s not my fault,” Seungri says.

“It’s hard,” Daesung says. “Promoting six songs at once.”

“Hmm,” the makeup artist says, but her face is already softening, and her lips are curling up a bit at the edges. “Fine, fine,” she says. “Let me see what I can do to cover it up.”

“Thank you,” Seungri says, and tries to hold still and not fall asleep.

Jiyong sits down next to him. Seungri can’t help but look at Jiyong’s wrists. They’re so thin. “What are you staring at, maknae?”

“Did you eat today, hyung?”

“I don’t need a keeper,” Jiyong replies, his tone a little sharp, running a hand through his bangs, untangling a bit in the front that’s become mussed from pulling on his t-shirt. “Especially not you, maknae.”

Seungri knows that, but he can’t help but worry about Jiyong, because… Seungri’s always watched Jiyong the most carefully. “I know.”

Jiyong exhales, and looks at Seungri out of the corner of his eye. Whatever he sees makes his face soften. He spins in the chair. “I did.” He clears his throat. “Eat. Earlier.”

“That’s good,” Seungri whispers, and then Seunghyun shouts, and there’s a crashing sound, and Seungri turns his head, making his make-up artist, who’s turned her attention to Seungri’s short hair, smack him chidingly on the shoulder.

Seunghyun is on the floor, one foot in Youngbae’s discarded sweatpants and a half-hearted scowl on his face, and Daesung and Youngbae are just laughing, and Seungri wants to laugh too but he’s just too tired to laugh.

Jiyong reaches out and touches Seungri’s cheek, thumb moving in barely-there circles across a cheek sporting too much foundation. “Maknae, you look tired.”

For some reason, when his eyes focus in on Jiyong again, it’s like he’s looking into a mirror. “You too, hyung,” Seungri licks his lips again. This time, he tastes wax and gloss. “You look tired too.”

“I am,” Jiyong says, and maybe things aren’t right again, not yet, but it’s something close.

*

 

Sometimes, Seungri thinks he is falling apart, shattering underneath the weight of how much he feels.

Jiyong, somehow, always puts him back together, because Seungri can’t imagine Jiyong falling apart, and it gives him the strength to keep moving forward.

 

*

The first week they live together, Jiyong doesn’t sleep.

Seungri doesn’t know how he manages to make it through practices and meetings and rehearsals without a wink of sleep, but Jiyong does, because Jiyong, in Seungri’s opinion, is the strongest person Seungri has ever met.

Jiyong’s nights are devoted to music. He puts his headphones in and plays on his laptop, mixing beats and rapping under his breath, creating the tracks that later they’ll all sing together.

“Maknae, come here,” Jiyong says, late into the night when Seungri should be sleeping. Seungri doesn’t pretend like he’s not awake, he just crawls out of bed and walks over to his leader, feet quietly shuffling across the cold wooden floor. “Sing this,” Jiyong says, and Seungri does, voice raspy with sleep, and Jiyong smiles.

“You’re all right, maknae,” Jiyong says, and he wraps a bony arm around Seungri’s waist, and Seungri is drowning.

 

*

Perfect is the slow simmer of Seungri’s blood when Jiyong’s nimble, thin fingers tease and tickle their way up his arm while Jiyong smiles and extrapolates for a curious interviewer.

Perfect is the way Seungri’s body flashes from hot to cold as he stares at Jiyong from across the room, eyes following every movement Jiyong makes, a slow twist in his gut as Jiyong shimmies and shakes and bends the music around him like it’s nothing. He doesn’t even sweat. “You’re so obvious,” Seunghyun says, and Seungri can’t deny it.

Perfect is not the way Seungri’s heart shatters into a million pieces every time Jiyong sees him staring and smiles, triumphant, at the way he’s managed to keep Seungri enthralled for the past five years without a stutter or stall.

But maybe perfect is the way that Seungri doesn’t care, at all, because he’s too busy bathing in Jiyong’s light to notice.

 

*

 

The thing about pedestals is that it hurts so much to topple from them.

Seungri’s not sure whom it hurts more, when Jiyong falls.

Seungri kind of hopes it’s him, because his chest feels a little like it’s been torn open, and the outside air is more than his heart can bear.

He doesn’t wish this feeling on Jiyong. Mostly he just wants to gather Jiyong close and ask him _why_.

Jiyong had told him, long ago, that he wasn’t perfect. Seungri hadn’t wanted to believe him.

Seungri doesn’t think that Jiyong, even after all this time, understands what perfect is.

 

*

 

“I messed up,” Jiyong says. “And I can lie about it, and close my eyes, and wish it away, and maybe Korea will let me, but I’ve messed up, and I’ll know it.”

“Yeah,” Seungri says, and Jiyong turns to look at Seungri, eyes wide.

“What?” Jiyong says, because Seungri has never agreed with Jiyong, not about something like this.

“Yeah, you messed up,” Seungri says, and he laughs, because he’s done crying, now, and his heart isn’t so heavy anymore. “Bad Boy.”

“Daesung’s made so many ‘High High’ jokes, I can’t even deal with it anymore,” Jiyong says, the tiniest bit of humor in his voice. “I messed up.”

“You’re human,” Seungri says, and shrugs. “All we can do is make mistakes.”

“You used to think I was perfect,” Jiyong says, and there’s a slow tide of melancholy rising in his eyes. “Before.”

Seungri looks down at his hands, which clutch giant handfuls of his jeans, digging into the denim as he thinks about what to say.

“You still are,” Seungri says, because even after years in show business, he’s still not one to watch what he says.

“How can you say that?” Jiyong asks, and for some reason, he looks fractured in Seungri’s eyes, like pieces of him don’t quite fit together right anymore. It only makes him more beautiful, Seungri thinks, like stained glass in a church window.

“Because you’ve never understood what perfect is to me,” Seungri says, and Jiyong’s hunched shoulders, bowed under the wait of his own crushing self-expectations, don’t waver. It’s always been admiration for how much Jiyong can take. “Hyung is strong, and even through this, you’ll lead us.”

Jiyong looks at Seungri then, and there’s something new in his eyes, that sends a quiver down Seungri’s spine.

*

Daesung teaches Seungri how to use the equipment in the gym with a painstaking eye, catching every shift of Seungri’s muscles, watching for injury. “You’re too young for this,” Daesung says, when Seungri asks, but then he smiles and agrees. “Just so you don’t try it by yourself,” he adds.

Seungri is grateful, because Daesung is kind, and he wouldn’t have been able to ask the others.

“Have you ever been in love?” Seungri asks, and he doesn’t mean to ask it aloud, but now he has. He feels his face redden, and it’s hard to avoid the way Daesung’s gaze is locked on to Seungri like he’s a particularly interesting puzzle.

“No,” Daesung says. “Except with music.” Daesung clears his throat. “Is there something…?”

“Ah,” Seungri says. “No, no. It’s nothing,” Seungri replies, waving his hands anxiously, then wincing at the pull in his arms.

“You’ll be sore,” Daesung says wryly. “Until your body adjusts.” Daesung tilts his head to the side. “Love’s probably different from exercise.”

“What do you mean?” Seungri asks, and Daesung scratches at his head, scrunching up his face in thought.

“Well,” he says. “With exercise, you adjust, and you get stronger, and then you increase the weight.” Daesung sighs. “But with love, the weight gets heavier, and you get weaker, right? As it wears you down?”

Seungri manages a choked laugh. “You sing too many sad love songs, hyung,” Seungri says, and Daesung looks sheepish.

“You’re right. That was a little melodramatic, huh?” He shakes his head, and his hair sticks to his face.

Seungri wonders, though, if there isn’t a kernel of truth in it, because days pass, and he looks at Jiyong, and watches Jiyong, and he just wants to move closer and closer, and it’s never enough, and he’s never felt so weak.

 

*

The first time that Seungri realizes love is a liability is when an interviewer asks which member he likes the most and Seungri doesn’t even have to think about it, “G-Dragon” coming to his lips without a moment spared for his brain to process, and the others laugh and tease at how fast he answers.

Jiyong is so pleased, lips curling, and eyes glinting, and he’s so… he’s beautiful, to Seungri, and Seungri can’t take his eyes off of him, and it’s awful, because there’s nothing he can do but drown in it, because Jiyong already knows everything and Seungri hasn’t even begun to learn.

Later, though, Seunghyun pulls him aside. “Don’t get hurt, maknae,” he says, eyes unusually serious.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Seungri says, even though he does.

“You’re only human,” Seunghyun says, and Seungri knows that all too well.

 

*

 

“Hyung, can I tell you a secret?” Seungri asks, and Jiyong looks at him, crossing his arms over his chest.

“No,” Jiyong says. “If it’s a secret, you shouldn’t tell anyone.”

_I love you,_ Seungri says inside his head, but on the outside, he grins.

“You’re right,” Seungri says. “I’ll carry the weight.” Seungri looks down at his nails. They’ve been bitten to the quick. “You always carry the weight, right? I can be strong, like you.”

Jiyong doesn’t look at him. “You’re all right, maknae,” he says, and Seungri is weak.

 

*

 

New York is where they’ve decided to shoot the new music videos. Jiyong is worried about his passport, what with the drug charge on his record, but of course there’s no problem. Being a celebrity greases a lot of wheels.

Seungri gets sick the night before they have to leave. He toys with the industrial piercing in his ear (it still hurts) as he contemplates calling Manager-hyung to give him a heads up, but he decides it’s not a big deal. His stomach aches, and his head feels like he’s thousands of miles above the Earth, floating in the stratosphere, but he’ll survive. Of course he will.

Jiyong calls him, at one am. “I’m outside your door,” Jiyong says. “Let me in.”

Seungri peels himself out of bed, and shuffles to the door, regretting, for the first time in a while, that they no longer live in dorms, and that Jiyong can’t just invade his personal space without any enabling required.

When he opens the door, Jiyong scowls. “You’re sick,” he says, and Seungri shrugs.

“Not a big deal,” he says, and Jiyong sighs.

“You’re the maknae,” Jiyong says. “My maknae. Yes, it’s a big deal.” He shoves Seungri back into the house, and pushes him down on the sofa, disappearing into Seungri’s kitchen, returning with a wet towel and a glass of water. “Lie down,” he says, and he pulls Seungri’s head into his lap.

“So I can’t ask if you’ve eaten, but you get to come into my house and push me around?”

“You can ask,” Jiyong replies, “but I won’t answer unless I feel like it.”

Jiyong is swimming in his hazy vision, but Seungri valiantly trains his eyes on Jiyong’s face. Jiyong doesn’t look worried.

“That’s not fair,” Seungri says, and he’s not sure what isn’t fair. The fact that he’s sick, or that he’s always going to be the youngest, or that Jiyong’s hands, cool on his temple, seem to be soothing away the sickness like magic. Jiyong can’t be magic too, Seungri thinks. Seungri’s heart already didn’t stand a chance.

“I’m perfect, remember?” Jiyong says, teasing, but there’s a secret note of bitterness in it that Seungri’s been trying for months to ease, and he can’t because he fears his words aren’t enough to make up for his tears.

“You are,” Seungri says, and he’s too tired for pretense. His face must show everything, Seungri thinks, and he doesn’t want to pull it back, not right now when he’s feverish and tired and aching, and all he wants is the steady pressure of Jiyong’s hand on his brow, calm and cool. “You’re so perfect.”

He reaches a hand up to cup Jiyong’s face, and Jiyong swallows, and Seungri can see it, clearly, even through his haze. Jiyong is looking down at him, thick-frame black glasses partially obscuring his gaze, but Seungri knows Jiyong can <i>see</i> everything.

“Hyung, can I tell you a secret?” Seungri asks, and then he doesn’t remember much after that, just the way Jiyong’s hand doesn’t still, just keeps brushing the hair back until he falls asleep. He thinks, while he’s sleeping, he feels the smooth caress of Jiyong’s thumbs across his skin, but it might be fevered imagination.

He wakes up in the morning alone, but he finds Jiyong’s lyrics, crumpled, on the coffee table, left behind. They’d never managed to sing them, which is probably all Jiyong had come for. Seungri is weak.

 

*

 

Perfect is the way Jiyong’s smell lingers in his clothes, the fragrant eau of Gucci cologne and overpriced bath-salts scenting his old sweatshirt. Seungri doesn’t want to take it off.

Perfect is the memory of Jiyong’s fingers exploring the planes of his face, running smooth over the bridge of his nose and under his eyes, and across his eyebrows, the ones that are too thick to be an idol’s but Seungri’s made them famous anyway.

Perfect is the way that Jiyong smiles at him when he gets in the van, whispering “are you okay?” as Seungri puts his backpack between their seats and adjusts the cloth mask he’s wearing. Perfect is the way that Jiyong, focused and made of steel and fire and determination, stops to take a breath, and that breath is for Seungri.

Perfect is the way that Seungri, sick and nauseous and sleepy and cold, can feel Jiyong’s hand grab his own and twine their fingers together, and Seungri is mentally exhausted enough to delude himself, for just a little while longer, that this is enough.

 

*

 

“I’m sorry,” Seungri says, one day, because Jiyong is looking at an old picture, back from their trainee days, of Jiyong and Hyunseung and Youngbae.

Jiyong looks at him, quickly, and puts the picture away. “Don’t be stupid.”

“I know it was supposed to be him, not me.”

“I said, don’t be stupid.”

“Okay,” Seungri says. Jiyong sighs.

“I’m know everything, right?” Jiyong says, and Seungri bites his lower lip. “So you’ll just have to believe me when I say that this five, us five… we’re BIG BANG.”

Jiyong, Seungri thinks, is a leader. BIG BANG’s leader. Calm and strong, with everything together already. All Seungri can do is follow where he leads.

“Right,” Seungri says, and Jiyong smiles, and he isn’t handsome, and his teeth aren’t straight, and his haircut is terrible, because they aren’t idols, not yet, but there’s steel in his eyes, and Seungri thinks that perfection is wrapped up into everything Jiyong is, and everything he will be.

 

*

 

“Maknae,” Jiyong says, a heavy weight at the end of the hotel bed.

“Hyung,” Seungri mumbles. “What do you need?”

“Yesterday,” Jiyong says, “you said I was still perfect.”

“Yeah,” Seungri says, and he should open his eyes, but his head aches.

“When you get better, I’m going to ask you what that means.”

Seungri’s gut is churning, and it’s not just the illness, in the end, it’s everything about this moment.

_It means I still admire you. It means I think you’re strong. It means I’ll do anything to help you, anything you want. It means I love you._

Seungri’s not sure what he’ll say. He’s never been one to watch his words, but maybe he should start.

He opens his eyes, and Jiyong is smiling at him, the same patronizing smile that Seungri had seen when he was sixteen, and they’d walked down the street side by side, a convenience store bag swinging between them as they walk, and maybe Jiyong already knows everything that Seungri wants to say, anyway.

“Okay,” Seungri says.

 

*

 

Jiyong presses into Seungri’s side on the plane, still too thin and too worn around the edges, and Seungri tentatively wraps an arm around Jiyong’s back.

“You’re not so bad, maknae,” Jiyong murmurs into Seungri’s ear, letting his lips tickle the shell of it as he speaks, and Seungri wonders if it’s always sounded like this, and he just hasn’t been paying attention.

“I’m feeling better,” Seungri says, and Jiyong’s hand wanders up his arm, and it’s like a tiny spider, sending shivers across his skin that he’s unsure of; good, or bad, or just so wholly unexpected he can’t even fathom it.

Seungri is not afraid of spiders though, not even in the dark. Sometimes, Seungri thinks he’s not afraid of anything anymore, but then he remembers how Jiyong’s full attention can make him tremble, and maybe there are some things he still fears.

Jiyong’s lips are swollen and a little chapped, and his eyes are red from the flight, and his hair, the one long sweeping side, is in tangles from his knit cap, and all Seungri can see is the perfect way Jiyong’s smile stretches across his face like a sunrise.

 

*

 

“One day, maknae, you’re going to catch up to me,” Jiyong says, in a moment of melancholy that’s infecting them all. The studio hours have been harsh, because expectations for their comeback are high. Jiyong looks more weary that the rest of them, coming straight off unit group promotions for GD&TOP, and following it up with countless days and nights writing furiously into the night, composing with Teddy and getting things ready for the new group album.

“You’re running so fast, I’m not sure I’ll ever manage to do that,” Seungri says, and Jiyong rests his forehead on clenched fists. “Unless you slow down.”

“I can run this fast forever,” Jiyong says, and his voice is raspy and rough, and Seungri believes him.

“Yes, you can,” Seungri says, and all his confidence and trust is in it, because Jiyong will keep running and running until there’s nothing left. That’s who he is. Seungri thinks it’s beautiful, the way Jiyong can hold everything together.

“Then, maknae,” Jiyong says, and he lifts his head and catches Seungri’s gaze. “Don’t you think you should start running a little faster?” Jiyong doesn’t touch him, but it’s like he’s wrapped those thin, beautiful fingers right around Seungri’s heart.

 

*

Perfect is the way Jiyong peels off Seungri’s shirt like he’s angry it exists, pressing a hot open mouth to Seungri’s clavicle, and lathing a tongue along his sternum, his long, artistic fingers seeking dips and curves and grooves that Seungri’s never noticed on himself before. That’s all right, because Seungri doesn’t mind that the only times he can see all the pieces of himself are when Jiyong is tearing him apart.

Perfect is the way Jiyong’s hand wraps around his cock, curling around it as easily as Jiyong curls around him, setting a pace that leaves Seungri breathless and trying to keep up.

Perfect is the way Jiyong feels inside of him, everywhere around him, and he can’t move and he can’t breath and he wants to touch everywhere at once but he has no idea where to start, and the world seems like it’s in vivid neon, burning his eyes and matching the flames inside of him.

Perfect is the way the Jiyong never says that Seungri is anything but “not so bad” in private, but Seungri knows he matters, because when Seungri reaches across the distance to grasp at whatever parts of Jiyong he can reach, Jiyong folds into his arms like he belongs there, and Seungri’s left holding a diamond, flawed but brilliant, and he wants to hold on as long as he can.

Perfect is the way that Jiyong doesn’t change; he still writes lyrics until the sun rises, and after, forgets meals, and snaps when questioned. He still invades Seungri’s personal space in ways that make Seungri want to back up because he’s not sure what the cameras will see on his face. He still watches Seungri in rehearsals with an exacting eye, a critical statement on his lips or a cheek pinch and a tackle hug that Seungri doesn’t want to share with anyone waiting at the end. Perfect is the way he knows Seungri doesn’t expect him to change, because Seungri thinks he’s, well, _perfect_ , just the way he is.

 

*

“I really admire you, hyung,” Seungri says, later, when Jiyong is lying on his stomach at the end of the bed, naked and shivering in the morning air, brow furrowed as he examines the lyrics he undoubtedly wrote while Seungri was sleeping.

“Still think I’m perfect?”

“Yes.”

“Even after all this time?” Jiyong lilts, taking a break from his work to look up at Seungri with an unreadable expression, eyes narrowed like he’s looking for lies.

“Especially after all this time,” Seungri says, and he feels like that trainee again, young and trembling and wanting so much to be liked, and wanting so much to belong. And Jiyong is still like a star, except now all of Seungri’s dreams are coming true, and if he wants, he can reach over and touch, because the stars are at his fingertips.

“You’re so stupid,” Jiyong says. “We should have been a band of four.”

“Maybe,” Seungri says. “But you’re stuck with me now.”

For all the love songs he writes, and all the lyrics about aching and pining and pain and redemption, Jiyong has never been good with words. But that just means that when Jiyong says something deep, Seungri has conviction that it’s straight from Jiyong’s heart.

“Stuck with you?” Jiyong says, and the threads of insecurity have faded, like they never were. There’s something there, though, something new, that Seungri doesn’t recognize but it thrills him, because he’s always watched Jiyong the most carefully, and the fact that Jiyong can still surprise him is part of what makes him perfect, in the end. “I suppose that’s not so bad.”

And Seungri takes a deep breath, and exhales, and Jiyong’s hand folds into his own like they are two halves of a whole, and Seungri starts running faster.  
 


End file.
